subject: Gardner, The New Forest Coven and the Crotona Fellowship

When Philip Heselton published "Wiccan Roots" I was extremely interested, because he was describing events in my area, events in which I'd become interested when I first moved here over thirty years ago. But, as I tried to retrace his steps, I found that, although his research is immaculate and his data are solid, his hypothesis is, like a weather forecast, incredibly sensitive to input conditions. Change a couple of interpretations and a different hypothesis fits that data better. I was unaware until very recently that Sabina Magliocco, in her 2004 book "Witching Culture" approaches the topic of the New Forest Coven from the starting point of the Study of Folklore and reaches similar conclusions. Anyway, here's my take...

An analysis of Heselton’s reasoning and a presentation of my hypothesis.

A flight of fancy describing how it might have happened.

...and some earlier articles about Gardner?s (and Valiente's) material. My Wiccan Rede article was reproduced in Pagan Dawn in 2005.

(The Sacred Marriage article isn’t actually about Wicca, but is included for background for the Great Rite article.)


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